What is your approach to completing your Secondaries?

[DBC03]

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I'm interested to hear how others are approaching secondaries, since I want to keep up and complete these efficiently (quite a bit going on this summer and I got behind when we took nearly two weeks to move in the middle of June). I am trying to balance writing my responses to essay questions in a word document with actually filling out the information on each website. I think this is a losing battle.

Do any of you sit down and complete one secondary at a time in each sitting? Like, you fill out the information, write your essays, then hit complete? I feel this won't work for me since I like to put quite a bit of thought into my essays and then review them over a week or so. So I'm writing the essays out now and leaning toward reviewing them in a week. Once the essays are where I want them, I could get online and fill out all information at once. Would it be best to continue this way and then fill out the rest of the website information when I feel my essays are on point?

Would it make sense to prioritize the schools that have rolling admissions? I'm still waiting on three LORs, so I still won't be complete, but it would at least give them something to look at if they ever start reading early.

Thanks for any input! I know we all have a different approach, so I'm hoping I may gain some insight from your responses!

 

[efle]

It's early July, you should take your time. Unless you're applying to a huge number of places you should be able to write a draft and then come back to finish it a week later, and still be complete everywhere in August.

 

[aaronrodgers]

I write the day of and proofread/submit the next day. I know the quality isn't sacrificed since I have reread the same essay so many times due to copy/paste.

edit: I did all of Duke's secondary in one sitting, I reread and found some grammar problems....take your time 🙂

 

[DBC03]

edit: I did all of Duke's secondary in one sitting, I reread and found some grammar problems....take your time 🙂

What in the flipping heck? Are you serious? I'm impressed, won't lie. I do one Duke essay a day, at best. I started June 22. I still have the research essay and additional information to go.

 

[DBC03]

It's early July, you should take your time. Unless you're applying to a huge number of places you should be able to write a draft and then come back to finish it a week later, and still be complete everywhere in August.

I'm trying to force myself to write them in the order I have received them (at least the essays). I'm having a difficult time staying on task - I like to bounce to questions i find more interesting or engaging. But I need to just force myself to go through each one methodically.

 

[efle]

I write the day of and proofread/submit the next day. I know the quality isn't sacrificed since I have reread the same essay so many times due to copy/paste.

edit: I did all of Duke's secondary in one sitting, I reread and found some grammar problems....take your time 🙂

You've got to change the yellow in your signature to purple or cyan dude. Can't read it at all

I'm trying to force myself to write them in the order I have received them (at least the essays). I'm having a difficult time staying on task - I like to bounce to questions i find more interesting or engaging. But I need to just force myself to go through each one methodically.

My approach was to write the commonly asked prompts first (e.g. a time you struggled/failed, diversity, a time you had to work with others, research interests). Make those good because you'll use them a bunch of times. Then the school-specific ones, which usually can be done in one day and submitted the next after proofing.

There are a few places that seem to use extremely long secondaries as a way to make sure applicants are really interested (Duke, Vandy and UCSD as examples). No advice for those other than grind away.

 

[enchantediris]

I had only prewritten a challenge, diversity, and gap year essay before the secondaries rolled in. My goal is to submit one secondary a day, with the overarching goal of being complete everywhere by the end of July.

My general strategy is making a spreadsheet of all secondaries, when I received them, and how much writing I have to do before sending them out. Then I order all of the secondaries based on a goal submission date (this changes all the time). For example, after writing an essay about a passion of mine for U Mich, I know that the Mount Sinai secondary can be submitted sooner because it has the same question on it. I have a bunch of secondaries that can go out after I draft a future career essay, etc. Duke is currently at the end of my list... lol

As for a timeline, when I receive a secondary, I paste all the prompts into a Word document. I also paste in any already written essays that fit the prompt. From there, I estimate how much time it might take me to finish drafting my responses, given what I've already written and what I'm planning to write for other secondaries. Usually the night before I plan on submitting, I send the Word doc to my boyfriend for proof reading. In the morning before work, I complete all of the information in the portal and proof read one more time before submitting and paying the application fee. I'm trying not to rush, but I'm also trying to submit everything in a timely manner (more for my mental state than anything else haha). Hope this helps! 🙂

 

[aaronrodgers]

I write the day of and proofread/submit the next day. I know the quality isn't sacrificed since I have reread the same essay so many times due to copy/paste.

You've got to change the yellow in your signature to purple or cyan dude. Can't read it at all


My approach was to write the commonly asked prompts first (e.g. a time you struggled/failed, diversity, a time you had to work with others, research interests). Make those good because you'll use them a bunch of times. Then the school-specific ones, which usually can be done in one day and submitted the next after proofing.

There are a few places that seem to use extremely long secondaries as a way to make sure applicants are really interested (Duke, Vandy and UCSD as examples). No advice for those other than grind away.

Haha thanks, I forgot I have been using SDN's Night Mode option for so long.

 

[DBC03]

I had only prewritten a challenge, diversity, and gap year essay before the secondaries rolled in. My goal is to submit one secondary a day, with the overarching goal of being complete everywhere by the end of July.

My general strategy is making a spreadsheet of all secondaries, when I received them, and how much writing I have to do before sending them out. Then I order all of the secondaries based on a goal submission date (this changes all the time). For example, after writing an essay about a passion of mine for U Mich, I know that the Mount Sinai secondary can be submitted sooner because it has the same question on it. I have a bunch of secondaries that can go out after I draft a future career essay, etc. Duke is currently at the end of my list... lol

As for a timeline, when I receive a secondary, I paste all the prompts into a Word document. I also paste in any already written essays that fit the prompt. From there, I estimate how much time it might take me to finish drafting my responses, given what I've already written and what I'm planning to write for other secondaries. Usually the night before I plan on submitting, I send the Word doc to my boyfriend for proof reading. In the morning before work, I complete all of the information in the portal and proof read one more time before submitting and paying the application fee. I'm trying not to rush, but I'm also trying to submit everything in a timely manner (more for my mental state than anything else haha). Hope this helps! 🙂

Actually, this sounds a lot like what I've been doing - I did the diversity, adversity, and a few other prompts before July. I have a word document with the prompts and then I copy/paste or write and then edit. I have been trying to rearrange them in the order I am receiving them so I can keep up. I have a spreadsheet going that has the list of schools in the order I received secondaries. And I'm going through the broader essay topics. But then I'll get stuck on one - especially the ones that basically ask me to repeat all of the information I put in AMCAS. I hadn't thought of adding how much work it is - maybe I'll add that!